Finding a Loved One
by Bone White Butterfly
Summary: When you find a loved one, your first thought is that he’s dead. Hope comes after. Terry found his dad, & now I understand what he went through. I found my father after he fell down fifteen feet of stone steps in the rain tonight. Me: BoneWhiteButterfly.


When you find a loved one, your first thought is that he's dead. Hope comes after. Terry found his dad, & now I understand what he went through. I found my father after he fell down fifteen feet of stone steps in the rain tonight. Me: BoneWhiteButterfly.

* * *

**Batman Beyond is not mine. The first part of this story, however, is mine, and I'm still crying.

* * *

**People say bad stuff happens when you're in a bad mood. Truth was, I was ecstatic at the time. Then I alighted from the basement stairs into the foyer, getting a prime view of the growing darkness and the coming storm through the open front door. Sean was babbling something to Mom in toddler speak off to the side. I was thinking he'd opened the door again. I walked forward to close it, and a man came into view, lying on the concrete at the foot of the front steps. Unmoving. 

He was on his stomach in nothing but his pajama bottoms in the rain, which was only getting stronger. Mostly I could just see pale skin, not him, just this white shape on the red-tinted concrete, arms jammed into its sides, one of its legs down in the large diamond hole where we were going to plant a tree. But the face was turned towards the house, and I could see that the thing was my father.

My Daddy.

Mom went out while I held Sean in my arms, trying to keep him from looking even as I stared. Mom was almost afraid to put her hands on Dad's shoulders, but she did, and she said his name.

Five seconds. Nothing.

Then he moaned. Understandable words

He was alive, thank God. Alive, nothing broken that we could tell, and refusing to go to the emergency room, as per usual. Once he was safely inside and I was sure he wouldn't shatter (it took a while), I hugged him as lightly as I could and retreated up to my room to brood. I found my computer on, showing Chapter Ten of the Batman Fic I'm trying to write. It was a scathingly funning chapter. I didn't feel funny, so I closed that window and opened a new one.

Blank word documents, they're great to stare at for long lengths of time.

So I stared, with Bats on the Brain. Terry found his Dad, like me, only he wasn't so lucky. Besides the obvious, I mean. The last thing I did with my dad before it happened was pretty nice. I hugged him and told him I loved him. Terry's experience was the worst-case scenario. I haven't seen the first episode in years, but it's suddenly coming back to me. Except the scene when he finds his father. Because there never was one. They left out that one to spare the little kiddies and to let us jaded ones imagine the scene ourselves. Well, I'm jaded now. I can imagine because I saw my dad tonight, and I was scared sick I was looking at a dead man.

So I started writing.

_

* * *

The home life's a bitch. It beats Juvie, but then Juvie makes a roach motel for humans look like a free stay at the Ritz. I get crap all day, and I know when I get home, he'll be standing at the top of those creaky stairs in the doorway. Arms folded, some shadow monster I have no choice but to slink up to. _

_He'll be there tonight. Even after everything's closed down, he'll be dead awake, demanding that I regurgitate all the crap I've swallowed today and explain it to him in vivid, graphic detail. He won't understand. He never does. He's worse than the rest of them together because he's supposed to be on my side. Instead I've got my Dad, He who scrapes Crap off you and Crams it back down your Throat._

_I looked out at the bay, wondering why I was fixating on the Old Man I had to go home to. If anything, I should have been stuck on the old man who had just kicked me out of his home. Out of his mansion. Out of his cave._

_His name was Bruce Wayne. He was Batman. Yeah, that was the understatement of all time, but that little identity fact still came second to what else the man was. He was also a craggy old Bastard who hadn't thought twice before setting that mastiff on me. Big black dog. Big white teeth. Big incentive to run. Lucky for me, the dog stopped at the mansion's gates and trotted back into the mansion after the big black bars slammed shut in my face. _

_I had stayed there, glaring back at the old man as he stood conspicuously at one of the largest windows. It was easier to glare at him than to even look at "Mr. McGinnis." No emotional attachments to screw with the hatred. We weren't father and son, not anything close. _

_He had turned away first, deciding I wasn't worth his time. What else is new?_

_Now I sat brooding at some scenic view of the bay. It was quiet but a killer spot. It was close to the cliff's edge, which you could throw yourself off of without much effort. There was a bench. To cinch the deal, the place didn't kick you out on your ass at three a.m. My jacket was warm; the bench was moderately comfortable; it wasn't raining. I could stay here all night. I didn't have to face him—not until the police dragged me home and he was standing in the doorway. Then we'd have a Force-feed Terry old, rotting Crap day. Gangs, the Police, Juvie—all those lovely memories. But we'd never talk about the Divorce, not once._

_Lose-Lose situation. Go home, I get so-called well-meaning crap. Don't go home, I get worse crap hurled at me. If you didn't notice, I get to use the word crap a lot when it comes to my life. I'm Terrence Crapped-On McGinnis._

_I slipped my arms from my jacket's sleeves and hugged it around me. One of the perks of being alone in nowhere-land: childish behavior a-OK. My Dad gave me this jacket. It was his before, and together we've worn it near to oblivion. I can still remember him wrapping me up in the big, leather folds when I was little. He was a good Dad then, not this angry "worried sick about me" one who's the disease instead of the cure. I keep wearing the jacket, hoping he'll see me in it and remember who he was. _

_Fat chance. I've been wearing it non-stop for eight months. _

_It was late. I needed to get back to the apartment to avoid some of the unnecessary crap. My hand went to the side of my face, where one of those Jokerz had gotten in a lucky shot. Ow. It was tender, and I knew it would look worse. It would look like I got into another gang fight. Wonderful. There would be a Crap Crucifixion when I got home. _

_I glanced back towards the dark Mansion sitting on the same long cliff. I'd just found the Bat Cave. I should have been ecstatic, thinking about blackmail and getting enough money to buy my way out of my crap-tacular life. But all I could think about was creeping up those stairs like a puppy knowing it was about to get its nose shoved in something. _

_One question: Why? Somebody tell me that, and I'd scamper up those stairs towards the crap with my tongue hanging out and my tail wagging. _

XxxxxxxxxxxXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXxxxxxxxxxxX

_I pulled up to the duplex, thinking 'It's not too late.' I could run back to that bench and hide out there from the cops until I turned 18 a year from now. Plus: I could glare at Bat Manor the whole time and probably run into the old Bastard on one of his damned walks. _

_Yeah, and Wayne would call the police, I'd get taken home in handcuffs, and Dad would personally full-emersion baptize me in Shit Creek._

_I took my time locking my bike. It was my only legitimate stalling technique, and I loved the Hunter's Model besides. She was my baby. Mine. Dad may rent the apartment, but everything inside it is his property. Case in point: me. I just happen to have this convenient hellhole called school to go to. But my bike doesn't go in his apartment or his garage, ever. _

_Turns out you can only test a lock so many times. My bike was now more secure than the Fortress of Solitude. Being a Gothamite, I might have said more secure than the Bat Cave, but after tonight, that's sort of an insult to my locking skills. I stood and started shuffling around the side of the building towards the outer stairwell that would me up into the clutches of a man fuming in the open doorway. _

_I turned the corner and saw the painfully familiar light spilling down the stairs from the apartment. It lit the splintered railing, the acid-burned patches of stair, and the spray paint plastering the wall. Staring at the paint, I knew the style. I didn't recognize anyone's signature, but I knew the style. Jokerz. I had run with a group of them for a time before I went in for the Big Time with Charlie. My Dad knew that, too. I felt my face pale. My old Jokerz connections, our I-Hate-You fest before I fled the apartment, the bruises from that gang fight, me getting back even later than I normally did—it all added up to a very dangerous conclusion._

_He was going to think I had something to do with this._

_Oh, crap._

_The whole 'It's not too late' idea came back to me with a vengeance. Metropolis was sounding really good right now. Antarctica sounded better. But if they were so good, why was I already slinking around towards those stairs? _

_Because the door was already open. He'd heard me drive in. If I bolted now, he'd have cops pinning me to the ground before I hit the city limits. That just left me the same familiar terrified walk up to the apartment, where a whole new world of hurt was waiting. The saddest part was that I was completely innocent._

_Fat lot of good that did me at this point in my life. _

_Head down, I crept to the foot of the stairs. I looked up slowly at the open door of the apartment with a wince on my face. Then my eyes flew open. He wasn't there. For the first time in history, he wasn't standing there in the doorway glaring down at me. I balked, not knowing what to do. Was he waiting for me to get through the door before slamming and locking it with me inside? I took a fearful step—in the wrong direction. My instincts were screaming for me to get the Hell out, not to start my climb up the damaged stair. But there I was, on the stairwell with nowhere to go but up. _

_It was a tall set of stairs. I had to climb three more steps before I could see anything besides a patch of ceiling and light. Then I caught sight of the wall, covered in the same jeering messages and random, violent marks as the stairwell wall outside. The Jokerz had gotten inside the apartment? _

_I froze, while my mind reeled forward. Of course they had. Dad would have heard the commotion and opened the door, thinking it was me._

_I bounded up the rest of the stairs in two leaps and hurdled into the apartment. Slashed and broken furniture. Every one of my Dad's shelves upended. As per usual, anything valuable was missing from the piles littering the floor. _

"_Dad?" I called, checking his room first. The bed was a tangle of sheets—looked like I had slept in it, but it was empty. His bathroom was a mess, the mirror shattered. The shower curtain was closed. "Dad?" I asked again before I threw the curtain aside and found a disaster zone of soap, shampoo, and shaving cream. Otherwise empty._

_My room was mostly untouched. I laughed then. Great, now it looked like this was my doing even more. My only alibi was the Bat Bastard. Good luck with that. Icould just see him giving me a cold smile before telling the cops he'd seen me with a bunch of Jokerz earlier that night. He wouldn't even be lying. How could this night get any worse?_

_My gut told me the answer, but I refused to listen. The dining table was a splintered mass. The fridge was overturned in the kitchen. The door was ripped open, and the fridge light was on. It fit with the pattern. Every light in the whole house was on, except for in Dad's office. _

_The first thing I saw when I turned on the light was red stains and broken glass. My heart jumped up into my throat, then plummeted back down almost as fast. Only ketchup and a broken mayonnaise jar. My eyes moved across the room. The computer had been obliterated, melted, and flipped upside-down. Every disk he had lay on the floor, smashed to bits._

_A Joker was sitting in my Dad's chair._

_Heart back in throat, back down again when I realized the clown was unconscious. _

_The odd part was, he looked too old to be a Joker. Shattered eyeglasses hung off one of his ears. He was wearing the Robe. It was from Father's Day years ago, the last present I'd ever given my father. Stitched in blue on the chest pocket was the word Dad._

_I barreled over. Up close I could see the Joker's face paint was a thick mess of smeared mayo and ketchup. His hair was spray painted green. Even inches from him, there was no way to tell who it was under all that mess. But I could tell he wasn't breathing. I took a step back. I didn't have prints or DNA on him. I could just leave him for the cops and find my Dad._

_Ignoring my gut, I scraped the condiments off his face, revealing bruises I hadn't seen the like of since I let a kid whale into me at Juvie. I'd been just a few days in, and I thought it was Hell. The only thought in my head had been, 'If I lift a finger against this guy they'll make me stay here longer.' The result was me looking like a victim of severe child abuse and a total wimp besides. Iron pumping had become a survival tactic after that._

_This man had the same bruises, the layered kind with mashed flesh where he'd been hit in the same spot over and over. It didn't happen unless the victim didn't struggle. Or was unable to. _

_But even under the beating, I could make out his features. The shape of my face I got from my mom. The angles were from my paternal genes. The man's face was made up of the same, familiar planes. _

_I stepped back, my hands slimed with mayo. _

_My Dad. I stared. Why hadn't he fought back? He had been in the army; he was a fighter. I got it from him. _

_I looked down at my hands suddenly. It was hard to tell who someone was when he was under a lot of face paint. I had been a Joker once. I knew._

_All the pieces fit. Even I thought it looked like this was because of me. Dad would have thought so too. My heart lurched. Had he just taken it, thinking one of those clowns was me? _

_Had he died thinking it was me?_

XxxxxxxxxxxXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXxxxxxxxxxxX

_A cop came into the holding cell and said my alibi checked out. Normally I would be over the moon but at the same time able to keep my face straight and my mouth shut. None of that happened around dawn. I stared blankly and asked, "I have an alibi?"_

_Smart, McGinnis._

_Fortunately, the cop had kids or a father or at least enough empathy to understand my brain was not working under the circumstances. He decided not to take that as an admission of guilt. The man explained, "Some old guy said you helped him back home after he over-exhausted himself on a walk."_

_Some memories clicked, including the one where that damned black dog with the big teeth chased me off the mansion's grounds. "Wait, Wayne?" _

_The cop nodded to himself. If I'd been a little less hazy, I would have realized he'd been checking that my alibi was legit. Being the zombie I was, though, I was seriously asking if we were talking about Wayne here, as in Bruce Wayne, the Old Bastard. As in Batman. I took the nod as a yes and leaned back into the cell wall. _

_Wait. Hadn't I been thinking the Bat would sell me out? _

"_You can leave when your mother shows up," he told me. "We've had a hard time getting hold of her, though."_

"_Hospital," I explained. Well, not really. Mentioning the ER, late shifts, and an inability to answer her pager would have been more helpful. To his credit, I think the cop got the gist of my one word speech._

"_Why don't you get out of here and go find a chair in the waiting area?" he suggested. _

_I nodded and stood, looking around. I was wearing yesterday's rumpled clothes. "Where's my Dad's jacket?" I asked. "It's brown leather, white stripes. He—"_

"_Hey, we'll get it back to you," he assured me. "C'mon, let's get you out of here, son."_

_I was beginning to think the guy really did have kids._

_Woozily, I followed him out of the holding area towards the front. At one point we passed an important looking office, where an older man and woman were talking angrily. They weren't arguing. It was more like they were commiserating darkly about the same lousy thing. It must have been the exhaustion, but I swear they were grousing about me. _

_It was my first time in waiting area. It turned out to be pretty nice, especially compared to the perp entrance, which I was quite familiar with. I could see my usual entrance through a sheet of one-way glass. Funny, I'd always thought that was a mirror. I sat in a bench seat facing the glass with a cup of coffee and wondered if my parents had ever watch me get dragged in there. _

_I watched the police bring in clown after yawning clown. They seemed deadest on dragging in every Joker in Gotham. That was comforting. The cops wouldn't stop until they found ones who—_

_Dammit, I was crying. _

_Now I was crying. Now that I was knocked off the list of suspects, sitting in a comfy seat, sipping the morning brew, and watching the Parade of the Criminal Clowns from the other side of a sheet of bulletproof glass. _

_Now that my Dad was naked under a white sheet in a drawer. Dead. It had been a terrible way to go. Terrible and special. People died all the time thinking somebody hated them. It was dead common. Come to think of it, it was a favorite Hollywood gimmick. _

_But for someone to die thinking you hated him enough to do him yourself—that was something special. _

_I cried, dropping tears into the coffee cup. _

XxxxxxxxxxxXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXxxxxxxxxxxX

* * *

**Quiet moment for Terry…**

**Okay, now I have to go on with life.**

**This was a One Shot, my way to cope with Dad's fall. It's probably a totally horrible piece, considering I wrote it during an emotional time when I was scared out of my wits. I'll probably take another crack at it sometime when I'm feeling objective. For now though,I'm just gladwe got Dad into the ER today for some X-Rays. He'll be fine. Another bit of news I just learned. Dad's youngest brother became a Daddy the same night he fell. A healthy boy named Thomas Peter. **

**So, life really does go on.**


End file.
